


used to say, "no promises"

by nosecoffee



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: F/F, M/M, Sense8 AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-15
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2019-05-23 16:31:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14937891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nosecoffee/pseuds/nosecoffee
Summary: She closes the cabinet door, and someone else's face stares back in the mirror, hazel eyes and a mess of colourful streaks and last night's make-up on a shocked face.A shocked face that is not her own.Alana lifts a hand to touch the mirror, and the shocked girl on the other side of the looking glass does the same.(a Sense8 AU)





	used to say, "no promises"

**Author's Note:**

> I think I meant for there to be more of this? I don't really know, it's been sitting in my pile of unfinished fics for ages. I figured I may as well publish it.
> 
> Title from "I Need To Be In Love" by The Carpenters
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Evan wakes in a cold sweat, in the middle of the night, a horrible nightmare still spinning and lacing it's way through his mind, getting fainter the more awake he becomes.

A woman, kneeling in the centre of a ruined, run down church, roof caved in, a gun in her mouth.

But, that's all it is - just a nightmare, Evan tries to tell himself, soothe himself, even if it felt so real in the moment.

He turns over in his bed, faces the wall, and tries to go back to sleep.

He's unable, chills dancing over his skin like a fucking ballet is taking place there. Whenever Evan closes his eyes, he sees her, staring into his eyes, seeming to tell him that it's for the best.

Evan knows better.

~

Zoe stares at her phone screen, eyes unseeing, leaning heavily into the wire chair of the café she's sitting outside of.

Every time she closes her eyes, she sees the gun, she sees the blood, she sees the woman.

She's scared to even blink.

No one seems to notice that she's in distress, and that hurts more than watching the woman kill herself over and over in her head.

She's supposed to have a gig in a few hours, Zoe reminds herself, and looks out the waterfront, at the sun reflecting off the smooth waves, at the sound of the water knocking into the support beams under the deck she's sitting on, trying to find it soothing.

She tries to ease the tension in her mind with an iced coffee, but nothing is working.  
She's being haunted.

~

Jared rests his head against the wall in his shower, letting the water run in rivulets into his eyes, into his mouth, spitting it out every few seconds to keep from choking.

He can't stop thinking about the woman he keeps seeing in the corner of his eye.

Can’t stop seeing the blood.

Can't stop thinking about watching her brains go splattering on the ground behind her.

Not even the hot water that used to soothe him can keep him from thinking of the scene in the church, as much as he wants it to.

Jared's probably just wasting water at this point. It's not working anyway. If he continues on this way, the water will turn cold soon, and if the weather app on his phone is to be relied on, it's only going to be colder outside.

He's going to be late if he keeps standing there.

Jared sighs and twists the knobs until the water stops, already shivering, even though the heat lamps are on.

He just prays he can keep her out of his head at work.

~

Alana is trying her very best to keep it together. She really is.

If she didn't know herself as well as she did, she wouldn't focus on how her smile is crumpling on the edges, like she smelled something unpleasant, how her eyes seem more tired than her posture.

Watching someone kill themselves, even if it isn't real, isn't something you get over easily.

Isn't it a fact, though, that you can't make up faces, that you've got to have seen someone's face before to dream about them?

If so, where did she see the woman, and how can she remember the dream?

Alana is left to ponder this, toothbrush dangling, limply from between her teeth when she got distracted.

She shakes herself from the stupor and spits into the sink.

She can make it through this day. She'll take her migraine medication if she can't get to sleep. She'll be okay.

She just needs to stop thinking about it.

~

Connor tries to talk to his therapist about it. It takes him a while to work out how to word it, but, once he does, it comes as easily as normal conversations do.

Connor asks him if he thinks it means anything, like a prophetic dream, or something.

His therapist tells him not to worry, but Connor met the woman's eyes before she put a bullet in her teeth, and she saw him. She met his eyes, pupils blown wide by something, and there were tears trailing down her face.

He knows there's definitely something wrong about that. Something wrong about her acknowledging him.

His therapist hands him an updated list of meds at the end of the session, tells Connor to take care, and to tell him if the dreams continued.

He'd be getting the prescription if he hadn't had the nightmare, anyway, but that doesn't mean that Connor's happy about it. He begrudgingly takes it.

~

Evan starts seeing things.

At first, he thinks he's going nuts.

A guy with glasses in cargo shorts, in the middle of fall, for fucks sake, at the park, who walked by him, one second, and was gone the next. Evan tried to speak to him, but as he turned to say hello, he'd simply disappeared, and Evan was left confused.

A girl with a guitar, a busker, out the front of his local shop, who his mother couldn't see. He had fished through his pockets for a spare note but he had none and apologised. She'd smiled. And an old man sat down on the bench, and she disappeared, into thin air, leaving Evan white faced and shaking, a little, in fright.

A tall guy with tattoos and blue, blue eyes, outside the comic book store, biting his bottom lip and scrolling through his phone. Evan hadn't tried to interact, and neither had the guy, but they met eyes and something akin to a gust of wind was set off in Evan's stomach and a blush rose to his cheeks. The guy blushed as well and then, in the blink of an eye, was gone.

A girl in a navy blazer, flicking through a grubby notebook, tongue poking out the corner of her mouth as she tried to concentrate, on a bench in the park, in the grove of sycamores. Evan had said hello, but she hadn't looked up. She murmured something about "fucking adjectives" and stalked past him, gone a second later.

Evan has no idea what to make of these visions. Thinks he might well be cursed.

~

Zoe can't focus at concerts, anymore. Too distracted, Zoe berates herself. She messes up chords, forgets words, drops off, staring into the distance, because she sees someone she doesn't recognise, over near the bar, someone not from there.

She keeps feeling things - hands on the delicate skin of her wrists, breath on her neck, lips on her collarbone - when there's no one there.

She suddenly knows more about trees than before, and she doesn't know why. A guy she's on a date with brings up the Californian Redwoods he saw on the way to Disneyland (he apparently took a scenic route), and suddenly Zoe, completely bored with this date, anyway, perks up, listing off details that only someone who'd seen the Californian Redwoods before could, and Zoe's never even left the country.

She feels buzzing on her arms and her stomach, like a needle, and a tingling feeling in her skin, like ink, but, when she looks, her skin is bare. It creeps her out, a little.

She sees ink stains on her fingers, paper cuts, and bandaids, feels the dryness of paper on the pads of her fingertips, joints aching from the roll of a pen, too many hours hunched over a desk making her back ache, when Zoe has been lying in bed, all day, on her phone.

She feels herself typing computer keys, eyes tired, and hurting, mind tired from coding and typing and sitting in a dark room for too long, the caffeine wearing off.

Zoe doesn't know who she's astral projecting into or whatever, but they make her feel things, see things, know things that she's sure she shouldn't. They make her curious.

She savours the moments when they're present, savours the feel.

~

Jared keeps typing the wrong sentences in, and he's actually gonna get fired if he keeps getting distracted like this.

He doesn't know why he opens a tab on Google and types in hummingbird tattoo designs, and then searches extensively for the right one.

He doesn't know why he goes looking for the guitar chords for Teen Idle by Marina and the Diamonds, and then feels himself, fingers on guitar strings, trying to sound it out.

He doesn't know why he Googles the definition for insane, but he definitely relates to the answer Google gives him when it shows up on his screen.

At least his tiny office is warmer than his apartment, or he'd actually die of frostbite.

Yes, at least there's that.

~

Alana sighs, and yawns, rubbing her eyes and sliding her glasses on as she pads into her ensuite. The headaches she's been getting for a few weeks now haven't worn off.

If anything, they've gotten worse.

Alana opens the medicine cabinet and takes another Advil, swallowing it with a handful of water from the tap, because she's much too weak to actually swallow it dry like so many people claim to.

She closes the cabinet door, and someone else's face stares back in the mirror, hazel eyes and a mess of colourful streaks and last night's make-up on a shocked face.

A shocked face that is not her own.

Alana lifts a hand to touch the mirror, and the shocked girl on the other side of the looking glass does the same.

The minute she blinks, the face is gone, and she turns, blinking profusely, trying to convince herself that she isn't in some weird _Inception_ remake, or another fucking _Alice Through the Looking Glass_ movie adaption.

Because she can't be.

The girl on the other side of the mirror is definitely not her, and it's not like she could actually sink through the glass or anything.

It's all okay.

She's just tired.

She needs a break.

~

Connor finds himself seeing through others eyes, when he closes his own. It's riveting, because he's never been anywhere but here. Never really left Paris.

A man at a desk, eyes focused on the computer screen in front of him. He hates his job, but it's also all he's ever wanted, he just wishes he wasn't so bored, all of the time, and didn't have to sit, every day, in that same chair.

A girl writing a book on a bench in a park, looking restless and frustrated. She can't think of an original idea. Maybe it's just because she's pushing herself to think of an original idea, and that's why there's nothing in her head. She wants to bang her head against a wall until all the cotton has been cleared.

A man in a tree, staring out at the immense forest around him, a look of pure, focused joy gracing his features. There's nothing more peaceful than being up here, Connor thinks, seeing through the boy’s eyes, nothing more alive than being in the wind and the Earth and the sky all at the same time, nose a little red, cheeks a little pink, teeth shiny in the weak sunlight.

And a girl on a stool, holding an acoustic guitar. He hears the chords in his head, her lilting hipster-singer voice, and Connor knows, somehow, that she she can do so much better, so much more good. That she can sing better than that, that her voice is just becoming what they want her voice to be, and once she gets out, she'll sing how she wants.

He doesn't know who any of them are, but he cares about them.

~

Evan sees the girl with the guitar around, enough to actually try and talk to her. He's at work, he's technically on his lunch break, hanging out in the oaks, when he hears voice singing, twigs snapping underfoot.

"I'm sorry," Evan calls into the trees, walking swiftly to where he'd heard her, "who are you?"

The girl in the lace vest, saffron streaks tangled in the teal stares at him, around an oak, and says, in reply, "Who is anyone?"

"That's not an answer!" Evan says, but she's already gone. He swears and runs to where she disappeared, already well aware that she's gone. She's not there, and there's no sign that she ever was.

That's almost more disappointing than knowing for a fact that she won't be there when he goes looking.

~

Zoe's gotten back on track in the gig department.

She hasn't stopped seeing the people, visiting their homes and their minds and feeling what they feel, but she's gotten better at ignoring them at inconvenient times.

However, this doesn't mean Zoe doesn't completely lose her breath when she sees the writer in the crowd, and she almost forgets to strum.

The writer wears glasses and a navy blazer, and she doesn't fit into this hipster crowd at all, but she's the most beautiful of all of them. Her nails are a mess, hands splattered and stained with varying colours of ink, and her jeans are crinkled, and she looks bewildered to even be there.

Zoe somehow remembers how to breathe, the minute their eyes meet.

The girl smiles.

~

Everything's going well and fine and he thinks he might not, in fact, be going insane, after all, when Jared gasps and grips the edge of the desk as pain ripples through his stomach, like getting punched.

He finds himself in an alleyway, wiping blood away from his nose, but it's not him, it's someone slim and tall and dark.

And, whoever they are, they're part of him, and he's a part of them, and if he's in someone else's body for a minute he might as well make use of it, so he throws a punch at whoever punched him, and they hit the ground of the alley, hard.

The person is out cold, Jared can tell. He didn't know he could pack such a punch, but he guesses all the fist fights he got into in middle school were finally paying off.

"Thank you," says the slim, tall, dark someone.

Jared shakes his head like "don't mention it", and he's back at his desk a moment later.

His knuckles tingle, and it's like a better high than a smoke break.

~

Alana walks down the sidewalk, trying to get some fresh air, beat this block of emptiness in her mind that stopped her from writing and made her feel hollow.

The feeling is sour and tart, and she shudders to think that she's lost something.

It was like one moment she was fine, and the next something was ripped from her mind.

At first, she thinks it's just a bad bout of writer's block, even though writer's block has always been about concentration and creativity and frustration, and never about the physical feeling of something being ripped and torn from her person.

Alana dismisses the thought, looking up into the intertwining canopy of the trees, above her.

"They're beautiful, aren't they?" Asks a boy, standing at the bottom of one, hand on the trunk as if he means to climb it, once she passes. He has blonde hair, dressed in a park ranger uniform, and he is familiar. Alana's seen him before.

"Yes." Alana responds, and sees him smile, widely, with shiny teeth.

He's gone, a moment later, but her smile remains. Maybe fresh air wasn't what she needed, and she needed, instead, was his presence.

~

Connor sees others. They see him. He knows they are just like the others, the ones that he sees, on occasion, the ones who slip into his body during a fist fight he's losing and help him win.

But they're different, because he hears their muffled screams in his head, feels how they die, and sees their faces.

Connor knows them differently from the others he's seen, because they are not alive anymore.

He doesn't know why he sees these people, why some of them are dead.

He feels the ache when they're somehow dragged away from his mind.

It's scary, because there's more of them, and then there aren't.

~

Evan feels an emptiness, and it hurts to think about.

He works longer hours for a few days, trying to keep his mind off the something that isn't there anymore. It scares him, how he so suddenly felt complete, and then so suddenly broken.

The absence has shaken him.

Evan doesn't know that it shows until his boss stops him with a hand on his shoulder.

"Take the weekend off, Evan. Catch up on some sleep." His boss tells him.

"But-" Evan protests, but he's cut off.

"No buts. Take care of yourself."

So he goes home. His mother thinks he's been fired, but he reassures her at their brief dinner, before she rushes off to work and leaves him alone, again.

Well, not alone. But, not together, either.

~

It's driving Zoe mad. She actually cannot take it.

She finds herself leaning over her sink, ripping open the box of fifteen dollar dye.

Zoe dyes almost all of the remaining blonde in her hair indigo.

There are faces missing from the crowd, and she isn't sure what she's done to scare them away, but she's trying her best. She really is, even though it's hurting her head.

The girl in the blazer gives her sympathetic glances from across the room, sometimes, like she understands, somehow.

The boy with the tattoos looks pained whenever she sees him, and Zoe thinks maybe they're more alike than she first thought.

~

Jared sees articles that no one else does, and it makes him shudder.

Dana Patterson, found dead on the roof of her apartment complex, killed by a heroin overdose.

Sabrina Patel, found dead in the street, killed in a drive by shooting.

Matt Holtzer found dead on the bank of a river, drowned and robbed.

Jared can't help but feel horrified, because he recognises each of their faces like he does his own, but not nearly as much as he should.

They're just as familiar as the four he sees regularly (the tattoo artist, the writer, the park ranger, the performer) and yet, he feels as though he should have known them better, and he doesn't know why.

Jared exits the tabs as fast as he can, trying to escape the new knowledge he has, but their faces stick in his mind.

Something in him asks, "Why didn't you protect them, Jared?"

Jared has no answer.

~

Alana is surprised, at first, and then calms, when she sees him sitting in her bathtub, hair hanging in front of his eyes, tattoos stretching up his wrists like he has something to hide.

She leans on the door jamb and flicks on the heat lamps. "Want me to run some water?" She asks him.

He looks up at her and she sees that he's crying. That explains why his back his heaving, why he's gasping for breath, why he's digging his black-painted nails into his knees, through the rips in his black skinny jeans.

"I'd hate for you to waste water on me." He replies, between breaths, almost like it's normal for him to be there, at all. He has a faint accent, one she can't quite place, and it comes out in how he pronounces some words.

Alana sits down beside the bath, dangling her fingers to touch the cold porcelain. The body heat from his leg is warm against her bare wrist, and she reaches out, a little, to touch his shin.

He jerks away, but then, looking her in the eyes, leans back, into her touch.

And it feels like a puzzle piece falling into place.

So she doesn't let go, until she falls asleep against the bathtub, and he flickers back to wherever he came from, no longer crying, just calm, and warm, and tired.

~

Connor shivers as he feels a hand stretching across his chest, reaching, from behind, for his shoulder, and he leans into the touch.

He doesn't know who it is, but there are no alarm bells in his head. Nothing telling him that something is wrong, here.

Whoever it is touches him softly, gently, like they're afraid that he'll break, but still wants to touch him, and that's almost the best feeling in the universe. He knows it's one of the four he sees on regular occasions.

He doesn't know any of their names, but he sees them sometimes, when he's sad.

When he's crying in an alley, because alcohol and marijuana can't enlighten him as to why he's still alive. Why he isn't dead.

It's in those moments that he feels the girl with the braids curl into his side, holding him tight, even as he sobs. In those moments, soft hands curl into his hair, gentle words from the mouth of the blonde boy. In those moments he can hear the strum of the girl with the colourful hair's guitar, can hear her voice singing. In those moments he hears the gentle tapping of the boy at the computer, can hear him muttering.

And it's soothing.

For whatever reason that he's still alive, so are they, and that helps, even if it's just a little.

~

Evan wakes up curled around someone he doesn't remember falling asleep next to. The room is unfamiliar, the chill in the air not quite as cold as what he's used to.

He spits the someone's long, dark hair out of his mouth and sits up next to them, looking down at them, coiled in the off-white sheets.

They roll onto their back and stare up at him with blue, blue eyes, and wink.

"This has gotta come to a stop." Evan says, recognising the tattoo artist.

"You sure about that?" Comes the response, a hand coming to rest, gently on Evan's wrist, thumb on his pulse point.

"Spectacularly," Evan says, and blinks, and he's back in his dumb twin bed, at home.

~

Zoe turns up the radio. It's a rare time that she enjoys what this station puts on, but today seems to be the day that they cater to her tastes.

She sings along to Phil Collins, windows rolled down, elbow peeking out the window, like she's a lot cooler than she actually is.

She usually rides with her guitar in the front seat, but ever since she started seeing the people, she's left the passenger seat empty, just in case.

It's hot enough to be leaning out the window, the strap of her tank top falling down one shoulder.

The boy with the glasses is sitting in the passenger seat, imitating the drum solo, and breaks into song next to her, and Zoe laughs.

"You've got real potential. Want to back me up on drums?" Zoe remarks to him.

"Nah," he replies, continuing to tap his thighs with the flats of his palms. "Too good of a gig right now to ditch it for a pretty girl."

Zoe laughs and pushes his shoulder, beginning to sing along, again.

He joins in.

The song ends and they're left at the traffic lights with Avicii.

"I'm Zoe." She says, extending her hand.

He takes it, shaking it in his own and saying, "Jared."

~

Jared has _In The Air Tonight_ stuck in his head, all day. Several people at work tell him to stop humming. He flips them off, just as pissed off as them.

Well, not quite as pissed off as them.

Zoe, from this morning, seemed to like his singing. Encouraged it even. Jared's never been that keen on singing, but sitting in her car, with her, makes him feel like he has a lot more potential than he really does.

Jared hears someone else singing it, not Zoe, far away, like a radio in a room down the hallway.

The singing in muffled by water. Echoes on tiles. If Jared closes his eyes, he can feel the water dripping down his face.

~

Alana sings it in the shower, loud and unapologetic, well aware, at this point, that they can all hear her, and imagines she can feel fingers twining with her own.

Imagines another hand on her waist, a chin on her shoulder, a wet front meeting her wet back, someone singing along.

Or, maybe she isn't imagining it. Maybe it's something she's really feeling.

When she glances at the mirror, she is alone, but the feeling is still there. Still making the hair on her arms stand up, still causing her nerves to sing.

Maybe it's the girl with the coloured hair, maybe it's her, or maybe it's the blonde boy from the park.

Alana doesn't care. All that matters to her is that the feeling is there.

~

Connor feels the pain before he even sees the blonde park ranger lying on the ground.

His left arm is burning, it hurts so much. Feels like something's snapped, feels grit against one side of his face, feels scrapes stinging and bruises forming.

Connor squeezes his eyes shut and opens them to a dark forest. The blonde boy on the ground, underneath a tree, doesn't move. "You came to get me," the guy murmurs when he sees Connor leaning over him, and smiles.

"Why wouldn't I?" Connor replies, and helps him to his feet. The remark makes no sense, even to his own ears, but it seems to soothe the boy, and that's all that matters.

He coaxes him to the path, and then to the parking lot, and into his car. After that, the boy can't make himself drive, so Connor just does what the boy with the glasses did, for him.

He somehow opens his eyes in the boy’s body, drives himself to the hospital, using his own resilience to fight the pain of moving the obviously broken arm, using the boy's knowledge of the town to find the hospital.

Once he reaches it, he's forced from the boy, and finds himself, back, outside a bar, in Paris. Like he never left.

~

The cast is unbearably bland.

His mom says he should get it signed. But signed by who is the real question.

The only people he'd like to sign his cast are far, far away.

Evan doesn't get to do all the cool things he used to, at the park, because of the cast.

He wonders why he hasn't seen the long haired boy since it happened. He sees everyone else.

But not him.

And that really bothers Evan. (And he doesn't know why.)

~

Zoe wants to know where she can send flowers, but she doesn't even know his name.

He's hurting, and she doesn't know where he is, or how she can help, but she wants the boy with the broken arm to know that she's there for him.

He lingers in the crowd at the bar, eyes fixed longingly on her.

He leaves before her set ends, the boy with the cast on his left arm, and she has no time to run after him.

That annoys her to no end.

All these people who run before she can chase, who look away before she can meet their eyes, who pull away before she even has the chance to reach out.

She just wants to catch up.

~

The girl with the braided hair and blazer corrects his grammar, in an email, sitting beside him. She picks at her nails when she's finished. "My name's Alana, by the way," she tells him, conversationally, "I live in Portland."

"I'm Jared," he replies, backspacing, without mercy, "and I live in London."

"London, really?" She says, raising an eyebrow. "What's with the accent?"

"Too much American television as a kid?" Jared shrugs. "I don't know, people think I'm eccentric, or something."

"That you are." Alana agrees. She crosses the room and looks out the window. There's really not much to see.

"Why are you here?" He asks her, taking off his glasses and cleaning them on the edge of his t-shirt. He watches her wrinkle her nose, watching him do it.

"Writer’s block." Alana informs him, tapping her temple. She grimaces, crossing her arms over her chest. "There's nothing happening. I'm stuck."

"I don't expect that I'm particularly exciting." Jared snorts.

"Better than anything else." She mumbles, shrugging and turning back to the window.

He rolls his eyes, "That's a lie."

"At least you talk to me." Alana retorts.

"That's a nice change, from the silence, I guess." Jared allows.

"Yeah." She murmurs.

~

Alana likes Jared. He has an American accent, even though he lives in London, and he tells inappropriate jokes that make her snort into her cappuccino. She starts seeing him more often - either he's just as lonely as her, or he's trying to help her get rid of her writer’s block. Either way, Alana appreciates it.

Alana takes him to a coffee shop, and he comments on the outfits of people who walk in. Alana has to hide her laughter, or take several minutes to try and not spit out the mouthful of coffee she mistakenly tried to drink just as Jared said something.

It's not all sunshine and rainbows, she knows, but Jared makes it seem that way.

Alana tells him about the girl with the coloured hair, about how actually in love with her, she is, and he smirks.

Jared tells her that she should learn the girl's name. Should learn more about her.

He's not afraid of a lot, Alana thinks, seeing how brave he is about so many topics, so many comments.

He's not afraid to tell her that he thinks there's more of them.

He's not afraid to tell her that he's scared that they've already lost some of the others.

~

Connor likes the buzz of the needle. He closes his eyes, lets the feeling be the only thing in his mind - not disappearing persons, and strange people who aren't from here, and touches that aren't really there.

But, he fails. The girl with the colourful hair leans over his shoulder as he gets the tattoo done.

"What does it mean?" She asks as she touches her hand, lightly, to the inked hand that now rests on his shoulder. Her other hand runs up the other side of his neck and into his hair.

"It's a memory," Connor replies, remembering the touch of someone who wanted to touch him even if they were scared that he'd fall apart, of how that felt, of the confusion as he tried to match it to one of them. "A memory that I don't want to forget."

"I'm too afraid to get tattoos." She admits, twisting the hand in his hair, a little, curling his hair around her fingers. It doesn't hurt, but he has to tilt his head in the direction she's pulling it.

"But not too afraid to sing in front of people." Connor quips.

She gives a short laugh. "That's a different kind of fear."

"Oh, really?" He huffs, watching the tattoo artist out a bandage over the new tattoo. The girl watches with equal intensity, as if it were her getting the tattoo.

"Yes, really." She replies.

The tattoo artist dismisses him, after that, and Connor exits the shop, followed by the girl, her streaks practically glowing in the neon sign, out front.

"Connor." He says, offering her his hand.

"Zoe." She replies, as shakes his hand.

~

Evan sees the boy in cargo shorts, again, outside a Starbucks. It's snowing, and Evan just wants to get to work, where there's heating and a sofa and a shift behind the reception desk.

"Heard of jeans?" He asks, as he passes. The boy rolls his eyes, obviously annoyed. Evan just can't believe that anyone would wear shorts in this weather.

"Heard of shutting the fuck up?" Retorts the boy, and Evan chokes on a laugh, and on his coffee, a little.

"Never really worked for me." He replies, and then the boy is gone, and it's just Evan, in the snow, with his coffee, and he hurries away.

~

It's a rarity that Zoe gets to see her mother. It's less rare that her mother has to rush off somewhere when Zoe is there.

That's how Zoe finds herself wandering the newly-renovated house that looks nothing like the one she grew up in, anymore. That's how Zoe finds the brand new swimming pool.

And, Zoe being Zoe, having a swimsuit in her suitcase, in the upstairs guest bedroom, takes off her shoes, unclips her hair, and dives in, still in her sundress.

The water is warm, the sun glaring through the water, and the tiles gleam with reflection.

Zoe breaks the surface of the water and sees the writer on the edge of the pool, jeans rolled up so she can dip her feet in.

"It's so hot here." She notes, stripping off her blazer, and leaning back on her palms. She wears a short sleeved blouse underneath. Zoe catches herself staring at her arms. "Where are you?"

"Timaru, New Zealand." Zoe responds, treading water. "It's summer here." The girl looks dazzled.

"New Zealand!" She exclaims. "It's fucking freezing in Portland!"

Zoe laughs. "It gets pretty cold, here, too, when it wants to."

She waves the comment away, smiling. "That's besides the point." Zoe rolls her eyes, and the writer laughs. "What's your name? I realised I've basically known you for two months, but I don't know your name."

"Zoe." She says, and nearly goes under, for a second. "You?"

"Alana." The writer replies, and they briefly shake hands. Zoe only barely resists tugging her into the water.

Zoe nods, "That's a real nice name."

Alana laughs, again, and Zoe dives deep, bubbles floating from her mouth to pop at the surface.

~

Jared feels like he's holding his breath.

He wants to sleep, but, whenever he seems to find his breath, it's gone again.

He closes his eyes, and opens them again, and he's floating in a pool somewhere warm enough to compensate for his broken radiator.

New Zealand, whispers a voice in his mind, and he doesn't know if it's Alana's, or Zoe's, or the tattoo artist's, or the park ranger's, but it doesn't matter, because it's an answer.

He feels his ears get blocked with water, feels the water lap at his face, gazing up at the impossibly blue sky, and hears laughter.

He turns, going upright, and sees Alana sitting on the side of the pool, Zoe doing laps in a maroon sundress.

Jared doesn't think they can see him, and he's okay with that.

And if he falls asleep, floating in her pool, and wakes up in his cold sheets, it doesn't matter, because that's almost better than a dream that he can remember.

~

Alana finds him on her kitchen counter this time, the boy with tattoos snaking up his arms. He's sitting, legs crossed, on her counter, picking through her fruit bowl.

"This is the most eccentric selection of fruit I've ever encountered." He says, a dragon fruit in his hand, without looking up. As if he knew she'd be there. As if he knew where he was by a single glance.

"I've been trying my hand at sketching." Alana replies. "To try and pull me out of my writing funk. It hasn't really worked out, if you catch my drift."

The boy with the tattoos looks up, now. He looks to where she's gesturing, to the pages ripped out of a notebook, stuck to her fridge door with magnets. "They're not half bad." He says.

Alana shrugs, and opens the fridge. "Do you want some yoghurt?" She asks him.

He shakes his head, "Nah. I'd hate to deplete your yoghurt surplus."

"'Yoghurt surplus'?" Alana snorts, letting the fridge door close behind her as she stoops to get a bowl out for the yoghurt in her hand.

"That's what I said." He deadpans, and turns back to the fruit bowl.

"Are you French?" His accent is clear, and it hadn't occurred to her to ask up until now.

"I am." He replies, with a soft smile. She sets down the yoghurt and the bowl on the counter.

"Am I speaking French?" Alana asks him, climbing up onto the counter, beside him.

He turns to face her. "Am I speaking English?" Is his response.

"This is so weird." She laughs.

"It is." He says, and then holds out his hand. "Connor Murphy."

"Alana Beck." They shake hands and burst into new laughter at the obscurity.

~

Connor is sketching, on his bed, when the park ranger appears.

He leans over Connor's shoulder, on his knees, hand hovering over the tattoo that's hidden by Connor's shirt. Connor shivers.

"What the hell is that supposed to be?" Asks the park ranger.

Connor lets out a short laugh, and turns his head a little to look at the boy. "It's kinda rude to say that to an artist." He informs him.

"Sorry." The park ranger goes red.

He takes pity on him, holding the sketchbook up so it's in better light. "It's a fruit bowl."

The park ranger frowns a little. "What kind of a fruit bowl has a dragon fruit in it?" He asks.

"Alana's." Connor replies, turning back to the drawing. He's far from done.

"Who's Alana?" He sits back on his heels, and glances around the apartment. Connor imagines it can't look that impressive, but he's looking at it like it's Notre Dame.

"The writer." Connor clarifies. He's only guessing that the boy knows who he's talking about, because that's how Connor referred to her for so long. "Have you met her, yet?"

"Yes." The park ranger looks sheepish, now, and itches the skin at the edge of his cast. "I just...I don't know anyone's name, yet."

"Really?" Connor sets aside his sketchbook, and turns to fully face the boy. "Maybe you should try and introduce yourself."

"Maybe I should." He agrees, and disappears before Connor can ask him his name.

~

Evan wakes up in someone else's bed, and for a moment he is scared.

And then there is the boy with the tattoos in the at the edge of the bed, giving him a look that says, "Where did you disappear to, last night?"

Or maybe that's what he's thinking. Those don't sound like Evan's thoughts.

"One of these days you'll have to tell me your name." Evan says, and sits up, looking out the window.

"Call me Connor." The boy with the tattoos says, before Evan blinks and is back in Twillingate. He's awfully angry at the lack of consistency on the part of this link.

~

Zoe sees him sitting next to her on the balcony, at her mother's house, with his face in his hands. She touches him, this time, a gentle hand on his shoulder, and he jumps.

Away from her, off the seat.

He presses his back against the glass railing. He looks frightened.

"Hey, hey. It’s okay. You’re okay.” She slowly gets onto the floor in front of him and holds her hands up in an effort to look non threatening. “I'm Zoe. What’s your name?" Fading azure hair falls in her eyes.

"Evan." The boy with the cast responds, voice croaky and seems to relax a little as she takes his hands in hers, turning them palm up. His skin is icy.

She sees him, sitting in the snow outside a dark house. The whole street is dark.

He isn’t wearing a jacket.

Zoe tugs him close. “You can stay here. You don’t have to be there right now.”

Evan sobs and disappears from her grasp.

Away from her and the heat.

~

Jared walks down the street. It’s snowing, but it’s colder than in London. And less rural. It’s snowing, but the sun is rising, so hopefully it won’t be as cold, soon.

He sees the blonde boy, the one with the cast, sitting outside a darkened house. He’s shivering, in a thermal shirt and pants. He’s leaning against the door, curled up.

“Watcha doing?”

“Sitting outside my house, in a blackout, as I am also locked out, waiting for my mom to come home and let me in. Probably the worst thing I could’ve done.”

“Not exactly your best move.” Jared agrees. "Where exactly do you live? ‘Cause this doesn’t look much like England.”

"Twillingate, Newfoundland." The boy replies.

"Well, it’s fucking freezing, here." Jared notes, and the boy snorts, nodding.

“That it is.” And a car comes crunching up the drive and he seems to brighten.

“Hey, before I go, what’s your name?” Jared asks.

“Evan Hansen.” He says this numbly, as if he doesn’t want to introduce himself. In that moment, Jared wonders if he meant to be locked out. Wonders if he maybe meant to fall out of the tree.

“Jared Kleinman.” Jared responds, but Evan doesn’t seem to hear him.

Evan’s mom comes running up the stairs, asking why Evan’s out here, and Jared watches as he crumples into her, shivering. His skin tingles as if he’s the one getting hugged.

~

Connor sits on his fire escape and smokes. Alana sits beside him. She has the chills, even though she’s wrapped up in the blanket Connor’s estranged father gifted to him when he moved out. For a second, she blinks into the blonde boy, the park ranger, and there’s snow everywhere.

And then she’s back on his fire escape, with Connor, a cigarette between his fingers.

"That's bad for your health," Alana tells him, shuffling a little closer to his side.

"Yeah, but the smoke looks nice against the skyline," he replies, looking out at the Eiffel Tower. Alana wonders why, for all his wasted talents, he never picked up writing. The way words seem to come naturally, she thinks he should have put that talent to good use.

But he likes his art, his permanence.

That’s what he told her, anyway. (“I figure, this way, if I die, there’ll always be a part of me, walking around on someone else’s skin, that influence, that impression. I’ll never be truly gone until all of them are in the ground, too.”)

She presses her face into his neck, feels the way he inhales the smoke against her nose. “Why am I so cold?” He asks her.

“Well, you are sitting on a fire escape, in the middle of winter.” Alana points out.

They go back inside and shut the window.

~

Connor knows he's in trouble.

The text is menacing enough without any weight behind it, but the threat holds up. There is weight.

The last time Connor was late on a payment, the supplier didn’t hold back, he made sure that it was clear what happened to people who couldn’t hold up the deal, so why not now? What was different now that could save Connor by the skin of his teeth?

The stakes are higher this time, and Connor knows for a fact that he will kill Connor if he can't come up with the money.

And Connor knows for a fact that he can't.

So, ideally, this is his last night.

(Connor knows the last time he got hurt, the boy with the glasses helped him, so maybe they can all feel it? Maybe they’ll try to help him? Maybe he won't die?)

(Or, maybe, if he's super unlucky, they'll feel him die.)

He hopes the blonde boy from his bed doesn't feel it.

Connor grabs his jacket, and decides to go out for a drink. He knows it's only a matter of time before they come to get him, and if he's gonna die, he's not gonna die sober.

~

"There should be more of us." Jared says, lying across Evan's bed, staring up at the glow stars Evan never got around to taking down. His dad helped him out them up, so there is a kind of sentimental bullshit the goddamn stars are shrouded in, but they're still kind of annoying.

"Yeah?" Evan says, from his desk, not really understanding what Jared is saying to him. He's actually not really paying attention.

"Yeah. I don't know why, but there should be eight of us, and there's only five." Jared says.

"That's weird." Evan notes, and traces the vein in his wrist with index finger (he can hear his heart in his ears, and his heart is beating much too fast to be normal).

(It's not his heart.)

~

Zoe feels something churning in her stomach. Something is off, and it's seriously getting to her.

She gets a taxi into town and sets herself up at a bar to make herself feel a little better.

"Connor." She says, and picks up a fruity cocktail from the bar. Just an acknowledgement of him, because she has a feeling that the churning stomach is his.

"Zoe." He replies, in a thick accent. An acknowledgment of his own. His voice is tight with fear. Zoe doesn't know how to help him.

He drinks a beer while she finishes her drink, and she feels safer walking home, with him beside her, even if he isn't truly there.

~

Jared feels the tattooed boy get punched in the nose and feels blood begin to run down his face, over his lip, and closes his eyes.

When he opens them again, he's standing beside the tattooed boy, kneeling on the ground, while someone holds his hair in a tight grip, a knife against his throat.

"Where's the fucking money, Connor?" Yells the man with the gun.

Jared closes his eyes again, and elbows the man with the knife in the gut.

~

Alana gasps and falls over, getting off the bus.

She's been shot, right in the hip, and, _god_ , it burns.

There's blood, but there's no bullet, and she never heard a gunshot.

It's not her that's been shot.

~

He loses the fight. Connor's not surprised. There's five of them and only one of him. Two, if he counts Jared, but he doesn't really, because Jared leaves him once most of them are knocked out.

The last one left kicks him to the ground, not that Connor was that far off it, himself. The bullet in his hip demands his attention, and all the fight Connor had left is gone.

Connor feels blood all over his hands, as he scrambles to find out how bad the bullet wound really is. He's too busy doing that to notice the man with the gun aim and fire again, at his shoulder this time.

The sound echoes off the walls of the alley, and Connor's scream of pain just makes it worse. His right arm goes limp.

He's panicking. He's going to die. He was ready for that, he had accepted that, but, now, his mind is in overdrive.

The man kneels down, over Connor. "Did you really think I'd go back on my word?” He whispers, close enough for Connor to smell his last cigarette. Connor spits in his face. The man backhands him and presses the hand down on Connor's shoulder, hard, almost digging the bullet in, further. Connor sobs. He grabs hold of Connor's hair, tugging his head back so it smacks into the cement. He holds him there, pulling so hard that it hurts.

"I'm not you, Connor. I'm not pathetic and weak. And I don't break my promises. So, I promise you, that if I ever set my eyes on you again, you'll wish that you died tonight." He punctuates the end of the sentence with another gunshot, this one to Connor's left ankle, and he arches off the ground with a scream. "If you don't die, tonight."

He kicks Connor before running off into the night.

And Connor is left alone, in the cold, on the ground.

"Connor," says a voice. "I need you to focus on your breathing." Their hands are gentle in his hair, at his temples, at the bullet wound in his shoulder.

Connor looks up, and almost cries as he recognises the blonde boy, "You came to get me." He says.

The boy smiles, sadly. "Why wouldn't I?"

~

Somehow, beyond all reason, Evan gets Connor to the hospital.

When Connor goes unconscious Evan is sent back to Twillingate, and he almost screams in frustration, because he doesn't know where Connor is, much less whether he'll live or not.

It occurs to him, while he pulls at his hair that he never told Connor his name.

There's a soothing hand on his shoulder, and he drags Zoe into a hug when he can't control his sobs.

~

Zoe waits, patiently, in the waiting room of the hospital, well aware that if Connor was dead, she couldn't be here.

She's never really been to Paris before, but with Connor she can be there whenever she wants to be.

That is, if he pulls through.

Evan got to him pretty fast, but the journey to the hospital had been long, and Connor had passed out almost immediately upon arriving.

~

Jared doesn't even think as he buys the ticket.

However they're connected - all five of them - it's important, and if Connor's gonna make it, he's not gonna wake up alone.

The flight is spent anxiously checking the time, and staring out the window at the blackness, and trying to sleep but failing.

Alana appears at one point and holds his hand for a few minutes before disappearing again.

~

Alana finds Evan, the park ranger, and Zoe, the girl from New Zealand, sitting on a bed together, holding each other.

A flash of jealousy followed by sadness rushes through her and they both look up.

They feel what she feels and the girl frowns.

"Come and sit with us," she says, and offers Alana her hand.

~

Connor wakes up and all four of them are there.

The blonde boy is holding his hand, and Zoe has her hand on his shoulder, while Alana and the boy with glasses who helped him hold hands.

The blonde boy bends into him like a tree in a storm, when he sees his eyes are open, a strangled sound breaking free in his throat.

"My name is Evan," he whispers, lips against the back of Connor's hand, and Connor feels tears on his face, because he didn't expect to wake up at all, much less wake up with people waiting in his hospital room.

 

**fin.**

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this. If you liked it, please leave me a comment telling me all about that, and a kudos, as well, if you'd like. Hmu on Tumblr @nose-coffee. Again thank you.


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